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In September 2014, an American expatriate project manager at High-Tech Construction Pvt. Ltd. (High-Tech) received a late-night call saying that an engineer at a remote project site in India was extremely ill after consuming alcohol at an employee party. The driver would not take the sick employee to the hospital unless the project manager gave permission, but would giving permission drag High-Tech into a complicated situation? The expatriate manager was unsure of the legal ramifications involved in death or injury due to drinking. In addition, he was concerned about the effect on the company if the media was involved. Because he was an American in a multinational company with Indian employees, the story was potentially more saleable. Furthermore, was it prudent to inform the sick employee's parents yet, or should he call the head of the human resources department for advice? As the project manager, he would have to make the final decision. It had been just a couple months since he arrived in India and less than a month since the start of work on the current project, and now he had a crisis to deal with.

In late 2015, developments in the Canadian television industry led the incumbent players to reconsider their traditional distribution strategies. The conflux of changes to technology, regulatory reforms, and consumption patterns was complicated by the entry of new players, forcing established firms to consider revising their business models. The regulated oligopolistic industry structure that once protected the players and ensured superior performance was under attack from many directions. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, which regulated the incumbent players, was pushing for reforms, yet the ramifications of such changes remained unclear. The incumbents responded to the advent of subscription video on demand services that were enabled by widespread high-speed Internet access, the entry of new non-traditional competitors, and changing regulations. How would the industry evolve? What was the role of the regulator? How would customers respond to the new delivery options? How would the incumbent firms, the regulator, technology providers, and content developers and providers reconcile their ambiguous relationships?

In January 2007, Metro do Porto, a light rail network, entered into an interest rate swap agreement with Banco Santander Totta on a notional principal of €89 million. The intent was to reduce the interest costs that Metro do Porto was incurring. This was a complex swap agreement that brought immediate benefits to Metro do Porto but proved catastrophic in the long run. Two years after the swap commenced, a "snowball clause" in the swap agreement took effect, increasing Metro do Porto's liability beyond 60 per cent per annum at a time when market interest rates were low and expected to drop even lower. It was unclear whether the company entered into this agreement out of ignorance, political pressure, or both, but the end result was a lawsuit. Students are expected to analyze the terms of this swap and decide whether the swap constituted good practice from a risk management perspective and whether Metro do Porto should have been able to anticipate the possible losses.

State Bank of India is India's oldest and largest bank with the government of India as its majority shareholder. Arundhati Bhattacharya, a 35-year old veteran of the bank, is appointed as its chairman in October 2013. Her appointment coincides with Moody's downgrading the bank's debt due to rising non-performing assets. She embarks on a mission to improve the bank's risk taking and management abilities, ensure uniform customer experience, and encourage greater collaboration among various verticals. Her efforts help the bank reduce it non-performing assets and improve its profitability. However, Bhattacharya knows that these gains will be fleeting without the development of a trained workforce who can address 21st century industry problems with speed and creativity. This requires transforming SBI into a performance-oriented bank supported by a new career development and remuneration system. Bhattacharya wonders if attempting to change the culture of a 206-year old mammoth organization is feasible or a mere pipe dream.

Amul is an Indian dairy cooperative founded in 1947, eight months before India's independence from British rule, and owned by over three million farmers in the state of Gujarat. It is India's largest food product marketing organization, selling 46 products, including pouched milk, cheese, butter, ice cream and infant food through a million retailers across the country, and is the market leader in almost all the categories that it operates in. Amul is well known among Indian consumers for offering high-quality products at reasonable prices, and runs a highly popular advertising campaign that spoofs current events. It offers its farmers 80% of the consumer's dollar for milk, compared with 35%-40% typical in some Western markets. Amul's cooperative dairy model has been replicated across several Indian states, thereby helping increase the incomes of 80-100 million farmer families across the country. However, despite its success, Amul is beginning to come under increasing pressure. Multinationals like Nestlé and Unilever are increasing their presence in India, and competing fiercely with Amul in value-added products like yogurt. The entry of large multi-brand retailers like Walmart and Carrefour in the Indian market threatens to squeeze Amul's margins and undermine its low-cost distribution network. India's large young rural population is shying away from dairy farming in favor of urban jobs, leaving questions about future procurement. Finally, Amul's farmers form a large vote bank in the state of Gujarat, and its cooperative structure risks being compromised by vested political interests. Should Amul continue with the business model that has served it so well for decades, or should it change its strategy in order to keep up with India's changing social, political and economic landscape?

Bimbra 4x4 was established in 2010 as an after-market customization service providing aesthetic and functional modifications for off-road vehicles. The platform of choice was a utility vehicle called the Mahindra Thar, popular for its bare-bones design that allowed for a wide range of modifications. Bimbra 4x4 adopted a buffet-like approach to its business, where customers were able to pick and choose options to completely customize their vehicles according to their taste and budget. The customer service, quality, and quick turnaround time made this service a preferred choice among off-road enthusiasts. Competition came from two very different segments. The first was local garages offering rudimentary vehicle modifications; the second was the vehicle manufacturer itself. Bimbra 4x4 needed to stabilize and grow based on an understanding of the competitive forces. Was the orientation toward the Mahindra Thar justified or was it a narrow dependence on a single platform? How could the business grow from a one-platform, one-location business into a sustainable multi-location company?

The case examines interest rate risk management at a U.S. utility company, Dominion Gas Holdings. In November 2012, as part of its new financing plan, it wanted to hedge the interest rate risk involved with the company's 2013 planned issuance of $1 billion in debt. While the coupon rates for the planned debt were unknown as of November 2012, the company wanted to lock in its financing costs one year ahead since interest rates were at historically low levels. The company was considering entering into a number of forward-starting interest rate swaps. The use of forward-starting interest rate swaps as a pre-issuance hedging tool could cause some accounting and regulatory risks, and some other utility companies chose not to hedge at all. A bank had approached Dominion Gas with an indicative quote for the forward-starting swap, and the Treasurer had to decide whether it was a fair rate. This case has been used in a first-year MBA class that focused on valuation of financial markets, and a more advanced second-year elective that focused on derivative securities.

Who doesn't want the ability to wield influence, and build or possess some sort of power? This case describes the ascent of a blogger at the top of the list of the most influential luxury fashion writers worldwide. He had made his way to front-row seats at fashion events, created a signature pose, garnered the attention of those who mattered in the high-end fashion business, lived lavishly, and was deemed a de facto representative of the Philippines. Yet Bryanboy seemingly had no boundaries on pitching a message of individualistic narcissism and misbehavior alongside his designer goods. People responded to him in a variety of ways, ranging from hostility to apathy to engagement. How did Bryanboy achieve the power to define for the world what's stylish, beautiful, elegant, and inspiring? And why did so many people loathe him?

The owner of Oliver's Diner in Grand Bend, Ontario, was confident that his new venture would be a success. His diner had become an instant hit with local cottagers and tourists, often leading to long waiting lines at peak periods. However, the popularity of the restaurant had led to some "growing pains," and the owner wanted to improve his operation. In particular, he was concerned the high volume of customers had placed a strain on his staff, particularly on weekends. He was also discouraged to hear customer complaints about the long queues to get a table, and longer than expected wait times for meals. It was early July 2016, and the owner was reviewing data from his first two months of operation. He needed to identify opportunities to improve operations and customer service.

RegionFly is a small, private airline specializing in ultra-premium services. Founded shortly after the "Golden Age of airline travel," RegionFly's financial performance had been strong for several decades. More recently, however, the results have taken a downward trend, due in part to the impact of the Great Recession on the entire airline industry. Not only were premium service providers affected more significantly, but the recent wave of mergers and acquisitions involving large airlines also leveraged new economies of scale, thereby reducing costs and increasing the competitive pressure on air travel prices. As a result of the deterioration in their financial performance, RegionFly was recently acquired by a larger provider, and several top managers were replaced. The new management team, supported by an external consulting firm, introduced a series of aggressive cost-cutting measures that resulted in a downsizing of the workforce, and impacted some distinctive features of the services provided by RegionFly that had been historically associated with the success of the company. Additionally, top management introduced a new product profitability criterion to be used in support of strategic decisions related to the composition of the product mix offering. The application of the new criterion lead to the elimination of two of the seven routes included in RegionFly's portfolio. To the surprise of top management, however, the cost-cutting and product-cutting measures did not result in an improvement in the profitability of the company, which, in fact, deteriorated even further. As the profitability of another route falls under the threshold, management is faced with an important decision: should the product profitability criterion be enforced, thus eliminating yet another route from the portfolio?

This case follows Sara Norton, a soccer player turned serial entrepreneur, as she transforms Seaside Organics from a fledgling startup into an $89 million company. Informed by the successes and failures of her first organics venture, WellBar, Norton tries to balance her naturally energetic, hands-on approach with the changing needs of a large company. Students discuss the differences between running a growing startup and a mature organization, and the tensions that can result between entrepreneurs and the managers tasked with running their organizations.

Employers are using pre-employment personality tests with increased frequency to identify the candidates best equipped to perform certain jobs and to eliminate the candidates least likely to succeed. While these tests promise higher retention rates and increased objectivity in hiring, they can also expose employers to litigation for violation of federal anti-discrimination statutes. This installment of Accounting Matters explores several recent lawsuits and the laws governing the discrimination claims, and concludes by offering several best practices for reducing the risk of litigation when using pre-employment personality tests.

Over the last decade, explicit emphasis on the creation of social value has grown in profit-seeking firms as well as non-profits and has even led to the emergence of a new legal organizational classification known as for-benefit corporations. Like financial value, social value is dynamic and therefore subject to perpetual changes in the firm's external environment, changes that yield opportunities and threats for the firm. Although social entrepreneurship researchers have begun to study the identification and exploitation of opportunities to create social value, this research has taken place primarily within the context of start-up organizations. In contrast, corporate entrepreneurship research has emphasized value creation within existing firms, but focused primarily on the identification and exploitation of opportunities to create financial value. Combining the two, we examine the creation of social value within the firm by proposing the social corporate entrepreneurship scale (SCES), a new instrument that measures organizational antecedents for social corporate entrepreneurship and that offers managers an opportunity to analyze whether the perceived environment is supportive of corporate entrepreneurial behaviors intended to create social as well as financial value. The article concludes with a discussion of the instrument's potential contribution to managerial practice.

Arthur Andersen collapsed in May 2002 and a significant part of Arthur Andersen India merged with Ernst & Young. Bobby Parikh, Mukesh Butani, Rajiv Dimri, Sanjay Mehta and Ajay Mehra, all of whom were senior leaders at Arthur Anderson, had joined Ernst & Young after the merger in various roles; however, they left one by one to establish a firm in their chosen practice areas, which would be differentiated by quality of thinking and enable clients to experience a different way of engagement execution. Thus, BMR Advisors was started to provide high quality professional services; wherein it wanted to differentiate itself and compete solely on quality. BMR started with services in three areas - Tax, Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) and Risk Advisory - a unique combination which could solve any business problem. Audit services and management consulting were deliberately not offered. BMR focused on maintaining a low leverage ratio, that is, the number of team members per partner, to ensure higher amount of partner time on each assignment. BMR Advisors thus far had achieved success with its low leverage ratio, that is, partner to team members' ratio, which in turn had ensured higher quality of strategic inputs to complex client engagements and higher amount of partner face time with clients. With increased growth in recent times, maintaining a lower leverage ratio was becoming a challenge, since growth entailed more engagements and needed additional team members, which in turn diluted the leverage ratio. New partners had joined from other organization and ensuring a seamless integration of culture was another challenge. Developing the next set of leaders to take over the mantle from the founding partners was one more challenge to be dealt with. Besides these unique challenges, BMR advisors also faced regular challenges such as talent war, technology, undercutting by competition, etc.

Siddharth Sinha is the CEO of an apparel retailer WE SELL STYLE (WSS). The retail chain was set up in 2008, housing more than 100 brands. In 2015, they operated over 200 stores in all four regions of the country. They primarily focused on providing good quality fashion at a remarkably low price. Markdown planning has been an important aspect of the apparel business. It is important to understand that the demand for fashion apparel is seasonal - affected by current fashion, variations in the seasons, festivals and hence difficult to estimate. An apparel retailer could go off target - either by overestimating or underestimating the demand, with overestimating being prevalent. The ordering-manufacturing-stocking cycle is easily a 6-month cycle before the selling actually starts; with an expectation to improve sales year on year, the procurement team buys more, making an increase in the variety of colors and styles to offer more to the consumer. However, not all styles sell as expected, leaving higher than expected stocked inventory, which requires an impetus to sell. The impetus in the industry comes in the form of ''end of season sale (EOSS)''. Decision on the percentage of markdown for EOSS is one of the most critical tasks for an apparel retailer. This activity starts months ahead of the EOSS. The product team and the planning team sit together and come up with an EOSS plan at the style level. In the decision process, procurement and planning team use their domain expertise and judge the performance of style using metrics such as rate of sales, full price sell-through, inventory left, and more. The key decision is to quantify the degree of non-performance of styles that did not sell as forecasted and by how much to markdown for the EOSS.

Ferrero Group is a confectionery manufacturing company which produces a line of chocolates and chocolate spreads with hazelnut as the main ingredient. The company is the largest buyer of world hazelnuts (25%). The company procures hazelnuts from Oltan, the world's largest producer of processed hazelnuts with a market share of 25% to 30%. Ferrero purchases almost 70% of Oltan's hazelnut production. Recently, there was crop damage owing to which the harvest of hazelnut crop is low. This has increased the prices of hazelnut. One of the customers (Esha in the case) is concerned about the price increase of Nutella owing to such hazelnut supply issues. Hazelnut is a major ingredient of this chocolate spread. Esha is considering Ferrero's vertical integration, in which it may decide to purchase large producers such as Oltan. Further, she is also evaluating the implication of such a strategy for the final market prices of Nutella.

The case on JOSEPHS® intends to highlight the various network effects in the architecture and operations of a Service Manufactory. Uniquely positioned as an open innovation laboratory in the Nuremberg city center, JOSEPHS® attracted a wide range of walk-in customers, who could be "prosumers", adding significant value to the tenant/firms, the university partner (FAU Wi1), Fraunhofer IIS, as well as the consumers themselves as they engage in the open innovation process. The case is positioned around the time when JOSEPHS® has completed one year of operations. This case articulates the architecture and design of JOSEPHS® as a platform, elucidates the network effects and complementarities, and pushes the students to analyze the various parameters of performance in a multi-sided platform such as JOSEPHS®.

The case traces the evolution of the advertising firm DDB Mudra from its founding as an independent "Indian" agency to its current position of being the Indian affiliate of the global advertising major, DDB Worldwide that is going to be overseen directly by the CEO of DDB worldwide. Set in the backdrop of the changes in both the global and Indian advertising industry, this two-part case invites students to consider the strategic choices made by the two leaders who shaped its growth and evolution - the founder CEO, AG Krishnamurthy (AGK) and the current CEO, Madhukar Kamath. The first case - titled DDB Mudra: Transformative Growth captures the company's history from its inception in 1985 until its acquisition by the Omnicom group in 2011, the second case, an update titled DDB Mudra: Profitable Growth focuses on the challenges that Madhukar Kamath faces in 2015, 4 years after the acquisition.

The case traces the evolution of the advertising firm DDB Mudra from its founding as an independent "Indian" agency to its current position of being the Indian affiliate of the global advertising major, DDB Worldwide that is going to be overseen directly by the CEO of DDB worldwide. Set in the backdrop of the changes in both the global and Indian advertising industry, this two-part case invites students to consider the strategic choices made by the two leaders who shaped its growth and evolution - the founder CEO, AG Krishnamurthy (AGK) and the current CEO, Madhukar Kamath. The first case - titled DDB Mudra: Transformative Growth captures the company's history from its inception in 1985 until its acquisition by the Omnicom group in 2011, the second case, an update titled DDB Mudra: Profitable Growth focuses on the challenges that Madhukar Kamath faces in 2015, 4 years after the acquisition.

Bigbasket was India's largest online grocery and food store established in 2011 by a group of entrepreneurs Hari Menon, Vipul Parekh, V S Ramesh, V S Sudhakar, and Abhinay Choudhari. In 2016, Bigbasket sold more than 18,000 products and 1,000 brands operating across 12 Indian cities. Online grocery market in India has been small, but a rapidly growing segment. According to "The Retailer" Ernst and Young's publication in consumer products and retail sector, during July-September 2015, India was among the top-10 food and grocery markets in the world, with an estimated size of INR 22.5 trillion (approximately USD 350 billion). The market has grown at 10-12% CAGR between 2010 and 2015, with food and grocery being the largest segment, accounting for close to 60% in 2015 alone. The protagonist of the case, Pramod Jajoo, Chief Technology Officer, at Bigbasket was trying to solve two problems frequently encountered by customers of online grocery stores. It was estimated that about 30% of Bigbasket customers place orders through smart phones. Unlike other e-commerce companies such as Amazon, Bigbasket customers place order for several products in a single order, sometimes as high as 80 in one order depending on their purchase frequency. When the basket size is high, using smart phones to place order is challenging. Also, it is a common phenomenon that customers forget to place order few grocery items which may result either in placing additional orders or customers purchasing those products from neighborhood stores resulting in a financial loss to online grocery stores. Jajoo and his team wanted to create a "Smart Basket" that would make placing orders easier for their customers and "Did you forget?" feature that would identify the items the customer may have forgotten to order.